Cooking Pasta
College Cooking Home Page Pasta rec ipes can come in all different varieties and difficulties. Nevertheless, one basic problem that anyone at any skill level can run into is pasta that is just not cooked right. Sometimes pasta is tasteless. Sometimes it can be rubbery and uncooked and other times it results in a giant mushy mess. Sometimes it can stick together in a ball and other times it can actually turn out great. Although there may be some problems with the pasta cooking process, there are steps that can be taken to lower the chances of pasta turning out unappetizing. Below are some ways that may help with the pasta making experience. Timing Counts The cooking instructions are a guide to cooking the pasta. However, the instructions are only a guide. Pasta may cook differently at different altitudes because the water boils at lower temperatures at higher altitudes (Source). Different water hardness levels and different heats and other variables that may be unique to your kitchen all play a role in cooking pasta. Use the minimum time recommended as a good time to check and taste test the pasta in question. If it is done in that amount of time, then proceed with your recipe. If it is not done, then taste test it every 1-3 minutes and keep in mind that sometimes it only takes one or two minutes more to cook the pasta to perfection Know How To Check How Cooked It Is If a piece of uncooked pasta is broken or bitten in half, it will have a white crunchy center. This white crunchy center is sometimes called the anima (Source). A good way to tell if the pasta is cooked is when the anima is faint and almost all faded(Source). With time and practice, using this method can help create a scale of how done the pasta is. This prevents the guess work behind blindly testing noodles and/or having to clean up the mess after throwing them against the wall to see if they stick. Put Salt in the Water In order to add taste to recipes people have commonly used spices. Salt is one spice that will add taste to the pasta as it soaks up the water. If you put the salt in the water before you boil it then the salt will dissolve in the water and then be soaked up by the noodles when they are boiled(Source). Stir the Pasta If the pasta is not stirred, it will stick together as it cooks. In order to keep the pasta from sticking together, breaking it up with a good stir here and there will keep the noodles from sticking together. Consider the Pot The size of the pot matters. If your pot is too small then it can not hold enough water to account for evaporation and the fact that pasta soaks up water. You should have a big enough pot to let the noodles move freely while boiling. A good rule to go by is that for one pound of pasta, a six liter pot is a minimum for good pasta.(Source) Bring it to a Boil First When you put the pasta in hot water that is not boiling, it will release starches that act like glue. Also, boiling the water keeps the pasta moving which will help keep the pasta from sticking together. (Source) College Cooking Home Page